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WORLD> America
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Mexico's health chief hopeful swine flu has slowed
(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-05-01 10:12 The US is taking extraordinary precautions, including shipping millions of doses of anti-flu drugs to states. Scientists cannot predict what a new virus might do, and the outbreak could always resurge later. Scientists are racing to prepare the key ingredient to make a vaccine against the strain, but it will take several months before human testing can begin. Production would not start until fall. "I don't want anybody to have false expectations," Health and Human Services Assistant Secretary Craig Vanderwagen said. "The science is challenging here." He said 600 million doses in six months was "achievable" based on a fall start.
In hopes of avoiding confusion, the WHO announced it will stop using the term "swine flu," opting for the bug's scientific name, H1N1 influenza A. Obama administration officials have also pointedly referred to the virus as H1N1 in recent days.
In the United States, where cases have been confirmed coast to coast, nearly 300 schools were closed Thursday, including at least 200 in Texas. The Red Cross said it was readying an army of 60 million volunteers who can be deployed around the world to help slow the virus' spread. Already, the looming shutdown was being felt in Mexico City. Traffic cleared in the notoriously clogged avenues, and the attorney general's office said even crime was down one-third compared with last week. Mexico City's infamous smog dropped to levels normally seen only on holidays.
Cordova told the AP that the extraordinary measures undertaken in Mexico were starting to work. Most of the Mexicans hospitalized with confirmed cases of swine flu have already been released, and he expects the suspected death toll to drop as health officials do further tests. "Without a doubt, once we study all the cases we're going to see some where there is no evidence or justification for linking them to this virus," he said. "I think, given the evolution this is having, given the full recovery we are seeing with treatment, there is reason to be calmer, there's reason to think that this can be solved quickly and well," he said. "We simply have a new virus with what is fortunately a low mortality rate ... so I think this problem will be resolved favorably." Swine flu is a mix of pig, bird and human genes to which people have limited natural immunity. It has symptoms nearly identical to regular flu -- fever, cough and sore throat -- and spreads similarly, through tiny particles in the air, when people cough or sneeze. About 36,000 people die each year of flu in the United States.
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